ETYMOLOGICALLY SPEAKING, the origins of the English word noise are disputed, as some adhere to its arrival in English via the Latin noxia (meaning “hurt, harmful, injury, damage”), but others believe its route to be through the Latin nausia, literally meaning “seasickness.” This brings to mind ad nauseam, “to a sickening extent,” which seems an uncomfortably suitable sentiment when discussing pollution, or human destruction of any kind. Of late, I have been most preoccupied and rendered sleepless by a sickness of noise, the audible yet silencing damage.
Before the world erupted into its epoch of constant and fierce noise, we would have been able to
